


A Doctor’s Vow

by Inkribbon796



Series: Masks and Maladies [68]
Category: Jacksepticeye Fandom, Markiplier fandom - Fandom
Genre: And that work is superheroing, Gen, Origin Story, Vigilantism, pre-divorce, slight blood, superhero au, workplace injuries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-08
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-03-01 16:41:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23940232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Inkribbon796/pseuds/Inkribbon796
Summary: Good doctors are hard to come by in the superhero business, but Iplier and Henrik make-do. They’ve learned how to help their super-powered patients through experience, Experience that sometimes hasn’t come easy . . . especially in the early days.
Series: Masks and Maladies [68]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1538131
Kudos: 32





	1. The Hippocratic Oath

**Author's Note:**

> Just wanted to get this out of the way: dammit readers I’m a writer, not a doctor. As such, there might not be accurate medical procedures, but I tried. Magic makes surviving serious wounds easier.

~::~ Twenty-Five Years Ago ~::~

Dr. Iplier was sitting in his office, having some lunch when his phone went off. He groaned and answered it. “Yes?”

_“Hey, Doc,”_ Abe’s voice greeted through the phone.

“Abe,” Iplier greeted hesitantly. “If you’re looking for a drinking partner, I’m still working.”

_“No, no,”_ Abe said quickly. Now that Iplier was listening he could hear someone groaning in the background. _“I need a favor.”_

Iplier groaned, resting his office phone on his forehead. “Why?”

_“Because we’re friends,”_ Abe tried.

The Doctor didn’t say anything.

There was a loud groan, _“Fine, asshole you owe me for smoothing over things with the ex.”_

“Fine,” Iplier grumbled. “I’ll tell the desk that you’re coming, just try not to be too conspicuous.”

Iplier hung up, and against all odds got to enjoy his sandwich before the front desk called that the Detective had arrived with his next patient,which set off a couple of alarm bells for the doctor, but he moved into a room as Abe was half dragging someone behind him. It was someone Iplier recognized, he was barely twenty — or at least he looked it — and Iplier was pretty sure he worked for Dark with the amount of odd injuries he’d walked in with before today.

Wordlessly the Doctor walked in with Abe and his new patient, eager to put a door between them and the nurses.

“Yeah, kid,” Abe tried to soothe as the young man held his side. “Don’t say I never did anything for you.”

“I don’t help the network,” Iplier reprimanded Abe.

“Yeah, why do you think I brought him here,” Abe defended. “Kid’s been more of a help to me than the whole damn police force. He’s not working for Dark, he’s working with me.”

Iplier looked between the detective and the kid, “You sure?”

“Oh yeah,” Abe smiled. “This guy is responsible for the Haddenburg arrest I made last week.”

Cautiously Iplier washed his hands and put on some gloves. “Okay what’d the kid get into?”

“Well,” the young man looked nervous. “I got hit in the side by an exploding road sign.”

“Points for humor, kid,” Iplier groaned, starting to carefully investigate the side he was holding. Iplier’s eyes bugged out when he saw a green-colored piece of metal sticking out.

“Abe, please tell me he’s not a minor,” Iplier felt the color run out of his face.

“No, no,” he pleaded. “I’m twenty-one, you don’t have to call them.”

“Good,” Iplier said and started working to clear the bits of shrapnel. It was a case of the wound looking way worse than it actually was, the street sign shrapnel was small, and not buried in too deep, but it was clear from the location of several of them that the guy couldn’t have pulled them out by himself.

As Iplier was sticking up his side, finding that he really had to work to get the needle in, he started talking to the guy. “So, how’d you wind up like this?”

“I was trying to take on Wilford and he got a little bit dangerous,” he responded, clearly trying to avoid giving away too many details.

“You’re crazy,” Iplier told him. “You know how many people had tried and died trying to kill that maniac?”

“Someone’s gotta do something,” he reminded, “if the police are too scared to do anything and the mayor’s in Dark’s back pocket, I need to try.”

“You got a name?” Iplier asked. “Cause we’re a bit too close in age to be calling you kid.”

“Yeah, it’s, Ma—” the guy started, before Abe roughly elbowed him in the shoulder, the side that hadn’t been hit with shrapnel. “Uh, Silver, I’m the Silver Shepherd.”

“Nice name,” Iplier smiled, trying not to feel too bad. “You come up with that, or did someone else?”

“What do you mean,” Silver huffed. “Of course I came up with it.”

“Well thanks,” Iplier told him, Silver looking a bit confused.

“Dark’s had the run of this city for years,” Iplier clarified. “No ones really had the guts to stand up to him and that circus-themed nightmare except for Abe.”

“Hey, you don’t seem like you’re gonna ask a lot of questions,” Silver smiled. “Am I able to transfer over to have you as my doctor instead of that other guy?”

_In for a penny,_ Iplier thought. “I’ll see what I can do.”

Iplier was thanked and the two of them left, Abe trying to encounter the least amount of people possible, leaving _“Silver’s”_ personal number with Dr. Iplier. Leaving Iplier to get back to his shift.

For the next day or two, Iplier didn’t hear anything from either of them. Which he guessed was for the best. It either meant that Silver was being careful, or laying low. Although he really doubted that Silver was staying out of trouble.

Something that proved to be the case when about an hour after Iplier got to work, the entire staff was asked to come into a meeting room. Which was about as bad of a sign as his ex-wife had given him when she was spending more time at her sister’s than at home.

A bad sign that became even worse when a guy in a police uniform walked in. He was talking with the director as he came in. Iplier, because of the part of town he lived, he’d seen the _“officer”_ in a very different outfit, a nice crisp suit that probably cost more than Dr. Iplier’s car.

“Thank you everyone for coming, it’s come to my attention that a dangerous criminal was either admitted into our hospital or different hospital,” the hospital director began.

Dr. Iplier was barely able to contain the comment, _“Yeah his name’s Dark, he lives in a creepy mansion at 1304 Hill Road.”_ Iplier bit his tongue, not wanting to get himself killed or Silver found out.

The man at the front of the room was one of Dark’s lieutenants, Lynel Bargs, he walked into the room, looking tired and bored. “Hello everyone, we’re looking for a freak who likes to dress up in white and black spandex. Would’a come in recently either with bullets in him or metal shrapnel from a little run-in with a couple of our officers. You see him, tell your director. He’s wanted for assault, and theft, he is also extremely dangerous. We believe he’s trying to take over several gangs in the area. So please for your safety, be careful and let us take care of you.”

No one came clean, Iplier tried to look as concerned as everyone else, but Iplier could see that a couple people were skeptical, even if they didn’t challenge what the young doctor knew to be one of Dark’s enforcers.

Some questions were asked, and they were dismissed, Iplier heading into his office and grabbing the phone, making a quick call to Abe. Thankfully the detective picked it up relatively quickly.

“Abe,” Iplier greeted. “Doc here, make sure you watch out for Silver, Dark’s trying to turn the town against him, make sure he keeps his nose clean for a little bit,”

_“Can’t make that promise, but I’ll do what I can,”_ Abe promised.

“Thanks,” Dr. Iplier sighed, hanging up. He knew he couldn’t turn Silver over. That guy was the closest thing to hope that Egoton had gotten in decades, and if Silver turned up again, Iplier knew he was going to need help. Help that Iplier was more than willing to provide.


	2. I Need 50cc of Common Sense, Stat!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Henrik learned not to trust his friends when it came to their own personal safety.

Chase almost drifted into a gas station’s parking lot, almost hitting the pay phone they needed to use.

“Could’a cut it closer, huh?” Marvin spat as he jumped out, Chase cranked the window down manually.

“Shut it, I’m doing my best,” Chase sobbed in panic as he jumped out and hurried to the back where both Jack and another of their friends J.J was in the back. J.J looked like his throat had been cut open and Chase had done a quick job of trying to stop the bleeding, Marvin’s magic helped to keep him from bleeding out. “Jay? Jackie?”

Marvin was in the phone booth, half of the glass taken out prior to them even getting here. “Fook me!” Marvin shouted, looking at the frayed phone cord, and used his magic to try and repair it. “Why is e’erythin’ in this town shite!”

“They’re not moving!” Chase shouted.

“Are they breathing?” Marvin called back. “What the fook is that bastard’s phone number, it’s long as shite!”

“I-I think they’re breathing,” Chase said. “I don’t know.”

“Switch me, then,” Marvin told him, ducking out of the phone booth and almost pulling Chase out of the car. “Go call that damn wet blanket and ask where he is.”

“He has a name,” Chase defended, starting to dial his personal number before trying the insanely long work number he had.

“I’ll remember his name when he gets a reasonable phone number,” Marvin reminded. “They’re still alive, so get ‘em on the phone, now.”

“I’m tryin’,” Chase shouted. Then finally he connected with someone.

“Hein?” Chase pleaded.

__ _ “Ja?” _ Henrik sounded tired.

“Hen? Hen!” Chase shouted. “It’s Jackie an’ Jay, they’re hurt, really hurt.”

There was a bit of muffled German. “Chase?” Another mumbled sentence of German. Henrik was too tied to speak German in the clarity that Chase needed, and Chase was too rattled to catch it even if Henrik had been speaking clearly.

It took awhile for Chase to calm down a bit to communicate, and Henrik to wake up enough to understand him, Chase’s rather broken and stilted German helping even less. But Henrik was awake and waiting for them to get to his apartment.

Chase was at the wheel, Marvin switching between keeping their friends alive and keeping them from being seen.

They arrived at Henrik’s apartment, which was unfortunately on the third floor, but Marvin’s magic made short work of the stairs. Henrik took one look at them, in his pajamas, looking like he needed about fifteen cups of coffee and twenty more hours of sleep.

“You ‘ave tah bee joking,” Henrik groaned as they set Jack and J.J on the floor. “I vas gone for tvo veeks!”

“Yeah, yeah,” Marvin took a couple deep breathes of air. “You’re welcome for keeping these two idiots alive.”

“Alive?” Henrik balked, looking like he was about to explode. “Vat part of zat looks alive?”

“Honey!” Henrik’s wife shouted back angrily, “Why are you all— AGHHHHH!”

“Go back to bed little Maüs,” Henrik sighed.

“Should I call the hospital?” She asked.

Henrik just stared at her, “Ja, iff you’re going too bee uph, off course!”

“Well you don’t have to shout!” She shouted back at Henrik.

“I’am not,” Henrik shouted back. “Zere are tvo men dying und bleeding oon our floor!”

Henrik sprung for his large first aid kit, something that he’d mostly used on Chase over the years. “Vat happened?”

“We tried ta take on a demon, an’ J.J and Jackie fookin’ went on alone,” Marvin answered, concentrating all his magic and effort on keeping the two of them from bleeding out.

Henrik looked up from his box, “Marvin, I svear, if zis vas in anyvay related too all you fooks drinking, I ahm going too kill you all.”

“This would be a shit time ta lie about this Heinz,” Marvin snapped back. “Start on J.J he’s worse.”

Henrik brought his first aid kit over, Chase just staring nervously at his friends, feeling useless.

Jackie woke up just as the paramedics were showing up, feeling like he’d been run over. “What happened?”

“You should bee dead, zat’s vat,” Henrik spat at him.

“Don’t shout, I’m walking up, man,” Jackie whimpered.

Henrik was directing them over to J.J who was still unconscious on the floor.

“You should bee dead,” Henrik spat at him. “Vat vere you all doing?”

“Fightin’ a demon,” Jackie said, looking around anxiously as the two paramedics were coming in, the memory of Anti’s claws coming at him still fresh in his mind. They gave Jackie a quick look before rushing towards J.J was Marvin was trying to keep his blood inside him instead of spurting out of his neck with the force of a fire hydrant because of how bad the cut still was.

“Is he even alive?” One of the paramedics asked.

“Yeah,” Marvin answered.

The paramedic was taking his pulse, shocked, “How is he alive?”

“Magic,” Marvin told him, the paramedic clearly waiting for a joke but when it didn’t come he grew pale and started looking over J.J again.

Henrik was starting to tend to Jackie, whose wounds were already starting to heal.

Jackie’s mind was spinning, J.J’s screams and Anti had . . .

“No,” Jackie was already looking around, feeling a cold shudder pass through him. Anti had followed them. “Marv, Anti’s here!”

“Where?”

The lights began to flicker and a glitchy chuckle came from nowhere.

“What’s wrong?” Anti chuckled and Jack felt the phantom creep of claws on his shoulders.

Jackie screamed, jolting away from the wall. Then he heard a choking sound and looked over to see Henrik with his hands on his throat.

“Hein!” Jackie jumped on him, trying to pin the German doctor to the ground. “Fight him, don’t listen to him!”

Henrik let out the same glitchy chuckle that Anti did, and his elbow was at Jackie’s head within human speed and force. The flickering lights were disorientating and Jackie could hear a garbled cry from J.J’s direction, garbled cries that were getting softer.

Jackie landed on his back roughly and Henrik was over him with his hands on Jackie’s throat.

“Let’s not play around little Hase,” Henrik’s usual accent was twisted by Anti’s glitches. “Once I’m done playing with you I’ll have some fun with the others.”

Jackie was grabbing at his hands, Jackie’s brain already starting to feel Anti’s glitches.

While everyone was frozen by fear, Chase seemed to shake himself out of the fear that Anti typically generated in the people around him. He grabbed the closest, heaviest object, which in Henrik and his wife’s misfortune was a glass vase. “Get off of him fook-face!”

Then he tossed it and with perfect accuracy it smashed into the doctor’s head, dropping him. Anti shot out of him, glaring at Henrik as Jackie was coughing, trying to get onto his feet.

“Ooooh~” Anti chuckled at Chase who was starting to regret his bravery. “A volunteer.”

Chase grabbed the end table that the vase had been on and held it in-between him and the glitch demon.

The world seemed to shift as if a wave of some kind was moving past everyone and suddenly J.J was standing on his throat. His throat stitched up and covered in bandages, a bit of old blood still soaked through them as if the wound was suddenly older.

J.J reached up and grabbed onto Anti’s leg, which immediately got the demon’s attention. J.J quickly pulled out his pocket watch and clicked the top of the winding piston. Color from both Anti and J.J seemed to vanish and they both disappeared from the spot they were in.

“Jay?” Chase began to realize. “Jay!”

“I’m dreaming,” one of the paramedics decided. “That guy was dying.”

A knock at the apartment startled pretty much everyone, except for Henrik who was still dazed on the floor and slowly coming to form his first brush with possession.

Jackie slowly got up, “I got yeh.”

The speedster’s gait was still recovering so he was a little slow but he looked out the peephole to see J.J standing there. Hesitantly Jack opened it. “Prove it’s you.”

J.J was just staring at him, clearly tired. He held up a small chalkboard and began to write. He was slow, looking like he wanted to take a nap.

Then he turned it around,  _ “Can’t talk. Have powers now.” _

“What’da yah mean? How’d yah get powers? Where have yeh been?” Jackie demanded. “Where’d Anti go?”

Jackie used his arm to clean the board, looking annoyed.  _ “Board is small, can’t answer several questions at once.” _

“Sorry,” Jackie winced, and let J.J in, scanning him over for any signs of Anti. Usually the glitch demon couldn’t stay undercover for long without a big dramatic entrance, but he was very good at pretending.

Jackie took the time to write,  _ “It’s me, I promise.” _

“Where’s Anti?” Jackie asked, Marvin already rushing into the entranceway and staring at J.J suspiciously.

The now silent J.J was calmly writing as Marvin was already casting a spell,  _ “Marvin said he wouldn’t be back for a week, sent Marv home, came back.” _

“Well he’s clean,” Marvin finally decided.

J.J smiled warmly, Jackie was still glad to see that J.J’s personality seemed intact despite whatever had happened to him.

“J.J says he’s got powers now,” Jackie told Marvin, realizing that no one in the other room could have caught their earlier conversation.

“Powers, really?” Marvin asked.

J.J nodded, writing,  _ “Yes, time travel. Chase has powers too, he hits things.” _

“Really?” Marvin commented after he was done reading. “Yeh all gettin’ weird powers?”

Shrugging with his arms, J.J walked into the rest of the apartment and just sat down in front of the paramedics, a new message on his board that read:  _ “I have some broken ribs, probably messed up my stomach. Don’t want to be awake anymore.” _

Then he laid back down with his chalkboard, letting the world around him just react to him. The paramedics began quickly working on him, trying to keep him awake so they could discern what was actually wrong with him. Henrik woke up enough to accompany them to the hospital.

“I’m not gonna kill ‘em,” Marvin promised, following Henrik out of the apartment complex.

Henrik glared at the magician, “You told mee zat tvo veeks ago. Myy Hause should not bee burned ven I return.”

“Gotcha, Doc,” Marvin seemed a bit crushed.

Henrik sighed, “Perhaps ven I return vee can talk about zat new medical kit.”

Marvin smiled, “I’d appreciate that, Chase is a danger magnet. Jackie hasn’t got an ounce of self-preservation sometimes.”

Henrik patted him on the shoulder, then turned to go with the paramedics, helping to tend to J.J on the ride back. He was glad to see that regardless of the implication of J.J actually travelling through time, J.J wasn’t dying of blood loss anymore.

Anti was gone for now and no one was dead. All in all, a win for Henrik.


End file.
